


It's You (I Always Knew)

by Chash



Series: Charity Drive 2018 [11]
Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Hollywood, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-05
Updated: 2018-10-05
Packaged: 2019-07-25 17:26:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,346
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16202216
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chash/pseuds/Chash
Summary: Bellamy and Clarke may or may not have gotten married on set twenty years ago.Okay, they probably didn't. But it's more fun to say they did.





	It's You (I Always Knew)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bethanyactually](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bethanyactually/gifts).



> We all heard about how Keanu Reeves and Winona Ryder think they got married in the 90s, right? It was cute, I love them.

"Hey, weird question, do you think we're married?"

It would be, as Clarke said, a weird question at any time, but it's especially more than Bellamy can really deal with in the makeup trailer at six in the morning. It's too early to be this confused.

"You know, I thought I was going to be happy to see you," he remarks, after a careful sip of coffee.

She flashes him a grin, and he has to work to not return it. They've seen each other over the last twenty or so years, obviously, living in the same city and working in the same industry, but it's been so long since they were in anything together. It's impossible not to be excited.

"Madi asked if I'd ever had one of those shotgun celebrity weddings, and you were all I could come up with. But I don't actually know if it was legal."

"I still don't know what you're talking about," he admits. "How drunk was I? I want to believe I'd remember getting married, but if it was after the 2011 Oscars--"

"For someone who thinks he'd remember getting married, you came up with the event where you might have forgotten getting married really quickly."

"I won an Oscar, Clarke. I don't remember anything else that happened that night."

"Maybe if I'd ever won an Oscar, I'd understand," she teases, no bitterness at all that he can detect. He _does_ actually remember her being there, congratulating him, the warm hug and the familiar scent of her shampoo. Just a few seconds, but he's always been glad she was a part of that night.

Still, he thinks he probably didn't _marry her_.

"Remember how Jaha was really into verisimilitude?" she goes on, nudging her foot against his knee. "On _Days and Nights_?"

"Sort of. I mostly remember how he wanted us to do a bunch of stupid shit because he thought it was realistic, but we were still making a movie about a werewolf apocalypse, so we probably could have fudged a lot more."

"We were making _art_ about a werewolf apocalypse," Clarke teases. "And we got married by an actual priest, not an actor. He did a ceremony."

"I'm pretty sure there's more to marriage than just a ceremony. Paperwork. Even shotgun weddings in Vegas aren't just saying _I do_."

"Yeah, but we signed all sorts of things because Jaha told us to. He could have slipped a marriage certificate in there." She shakes her shoulders out, half shrug and half stretch. "I'm just saying, I think there's a possibility we came out of that movie legitimately married."

"And you're just bringing this up now?"

"Like I said, I didn't think about it until Madi asked. I'm not saying we _are_ married, just wondering what your thoughts were."

"I had literally never thought about the possibility that Jaha was weird enough he decided we needed to get legally married for his arthouse werewolf movie, but now it's going to haunt me forever. Thanks."

Clarke laughs. "No problem. Happy to help."

"This is what I get for doing another movie with you."

"You could have said no."

He can't help his own grin now; it's mostly luck, whether or not you end up filming with someone, a question of funding and schedules, but he's been _trying_ to find another project with Clarke. They've had some near misses, almost gotten on the same set before just to have someone have to reschedule, something fall through. It's not easy to maintain a friendship with the lifestyle they've got, but they've done their absolute best, and he's thrilled for the next couple months of not having to work so hard at it.

He leans back in his seat with a sigh. "I guess I'll live."

*

Bellamy was twenty-three when he met Clarke, back in 1999, on the set of _Days and Nights_ , and it sometimes feels like he somehow stole all her good fortune. At nineteen, she was already a much bigger deal than he was, born into a Hollywood family instead of breaking into the industry like he had, her star on the rise. The movie was his breakout role, but she didn't need that. She was a breakout all by herself.

He'd resented her for it at first, before he got used to her. Hollywood is full of rich people who got their jobs with connections instead of talent, and Clarke, at least, had the talent to back it up. And they got along well, way better than he expected. He'd thought they might get more roles together. Hoped for it, even.

Instead, Clarke not only came out as bisexual but started showing up to things with her girlfriend, and the roles trickled away. Her career didn't die, not all at once, but she was a liability for a while, no one quite sure what to do with her, few people wanting to take the risk with an unpopular, outspoken, confusing woman.

"If I wasn't so loud about it, I might get more offers," she told him in 2005, when they were grabbing drinks after funding fell through for a dumb teen sex comedy they'd been attached to. "That's what everyone keeps telling me."

"Jesus, that sucks." He took a deliberate sip of his beer, steeling himself. "I think I might be sometimes too."

"Be what?"

"Bi. I know I like women, but once you came out, I started thinking--"

She smiled, this pure kind of happiness he so rarely saw on her face. "That's why I'm so loud about it."

"Cool. Keep going."

He didn't come out, not for a while, and he sometimes texted Clarke to make her tell him that was cool, only feeling a little bad about it. Clarke could never work another day in her life and be fine, could have never had a career of her own in the first place, with her parents' money, but it took Bellamy a long time to get to that point, and even longer for him to believe he was at that point. But once all the Prop 8 stuff started, he couldn't keep quiet, didn't want to. He could be loud too. 

And it didn't cost him his Oscar, so he can't say it hurt his career.

Clarke's career had been doing pretty well by then too, and her stepping back in 2014 had nothing to do with people being assholes about her sexuality and everything to do with her ending up with Madi, an orphan kid who conned her way onto the set of one of Clarke's movies while her foster family wasn't paying attention.

He'd actually been the one Clarke called, when she was thinking of taking Madi on herself.

"You think I could handle it? You took care of your sister, right?"

He had to smile. "I was in high school, Clarke, it's not really the same thing. You're thirty-four. That's a normal age to be a parent."

"Yeah, but Madi's twelve," she pointed out. "If I was thinking about having a baby, that would be one thing, but I'm thinking of adopting a pre-teen."

"You're thinking about adopting her because you like her and you guys get along, right? I'm not saying it's going to be easy, but if she wants you to take her, I think you should. And if she doesn't, let her go. That way, even when it gets hard, you'll know she picked you. That means something."

"And you think I can."

"I think you can."

Even over the phone, he could hear the long, ragged exhalation of breath "Thanks. Remember you told me to do this when I call you panicking in the middle of the night because I don't know what I'm doing."

"Don't you have other friends?"

"Thanks for the help!" she said, way too cheerful, and hung up.

He wouldn't have minded if she called him a lot more than she did, after that, but he thought she was doing pretty well. Madi's still a handful sometimes, but she and Clarke were always happy when he did see them, and Clarke seemed to be enjoying taking a break on her own terms.

Still, when the script for _Swiped_ came to his desk, he couldn't think of anyone else he wanted acting opposite him, and when he suggested Clarke for the female lead, everyone else was just as excited about the prospect.

And Clarke was too, so here they are, acting alongside each other for the first time since 1999, possibly married.

"I guess it depends on how you define marriage," he tells her the next day. He went back and rewatched the scene, tried to remember what it was like filming it. He'd had a crush on her, by that point, just in the background, as predictable as it had been impossible, and all of his memories of the end of the shoot are tinged with the sweetness of a young love that never went sour, just faded as he grew up and they grew apart.

"Hm?" asks Clarke.

"Whether or not we got married. I doubt Jaha actually fooled us into signing anything, I don't think he'd care enough. And even if he did, I doubt the officiant would have filed anything. It's not like he cared."

"So, no official marriage?"

"No legal marriage. If you think of marriage as less a legal thing and more a state of mind, I don't know."

"You think you're mentally married to me?"

"I think you're the only person I worked with in 1999 who could call me up and ask for a favor and I'd say yes with no questions asked," he says, with a shrug of one shoulder. "That probably counts for something."

"Something." She's smiling like she doesn't think he said anything weird, and the tension uncoils from his chest. "I'll let Madi know."

"Is she going to be disappointed?"

She rolls her eyes. "I wish. We were having a fight. This doesn't really help my case."

"What kind of fight?"

"She wants to get back into acting, I told her she was too young. Since I was acting at her age, she said I was being a hypocrite."

"So you tried to convince her bad things had happened to you, like maybe getting fake married to me?"

"Plenty of bad things happened to me," she says, face clouding for a minute, and he knows that's true. But she recovers fast. "This part was later, once the fight was over. But you know Madi, everything's evidence for a future argument."

"She really is your kid."

Her mouth twitches. "Shut up."

"So she wants to act?" 

"Yeah." She sighs. "I was hoping she'd get over it? I figured getting into acting before was her trying to get out of a bad situation."

"So why don't you want her acting? I know it can be bad," he adds, at her side-eye. "But I figured you guys could at least have a conversation about it."

"We are. But it's tougher than I thought it would be. I don't know how I can just--even before all the Me Too stuff went public, I wouldn't have wanted my kid in all this."

"I know." He puts his arm around her. "Sixteen-year-olds think they're invincible."

"She told me that college wasn't any better for women and went to look up statistics, so--"

He winces. "Was she right?"

"We decided sexual assault is under-reported enough that we couldn't know, which was depressing. But it's not like that's the only reason I don't want her in the industry. I still think she should go to college and she still wants to act."

"Are you looking for advice?"

"Do you have advice?"

He gives her a quick squeeze. "No offense, but you're rich and have connections. Madi doesn't have to worry about all kinds of things other kids would. Give her a gap year to try acting, and she doesn't like it, she can go to college. You don't have to tell her that this choice is going to determine her whole life because it's not. If it doesn't work for her, she'll still be fine."

For a second, she's frozen, mouth slightly agape, and then she starts laughing. "You're right. I can't actually tell her she's throwing her life away."

"You say that like it's a bad thing."

"No, it's not--" She leans back in her chair, closing her eyes and sighing. "It's just weird. I know that was true for me too, but my parents never acted like it. Every decision was life and death."

"It is for a lot of people, but it doesn't have to be for Madi, and she probably knows it. I remember when Octavia figured out I was making enough money from acting that she didn't have to worry about Mom kicking her out."

"So, she can just fuck up."

"She can, right?"

"Yeah. I just wish she didn't want to fuck up with acting."

"You're still in the business."

"Barely. And I had a lot of time to think about it. If I wanted to come back, how I wanted to come back. It wasn't easy."

"So why did you? Just too stubborn to let them push you out for your sexuality?"

"That was definitely a factor. If I was leaving, it was going to be on my own terms. And it could have been, especially once I got Madi. It would have been a good reason to leave, you know? And I did cut back a lot. I used to feel like I had to take any job I could get, but now I get to pick and choose." Her mouth twists. "At least until I hit forty."

"If I were Madi, I'd go to college," he muses. "But I always wanted to go to college."

"Of course you did."

"Honestly, the whole Hollywood thing should have blown up in my face. I told myself it was my best shot to make enough money to support me and Octavia without going into more debt, but I knew that there were way surer bets."

"But it worked out, and here you are, reminding a rich person that she's rich and consequences aren't the same for her as they are for other people."

"Well, they're not."

"I know. And I appreciate the reminder. It's good to have someone to talk you down from irrational crises."

"That's what husbands are for, right?"

She grins. "Yeah, I keep forgetting."

"It's like I mean nothing to you."

"Hey, I had to tell you we were married in the first place, so--"

"So we both need to work on this marriage."

"Well, we've got a couple months of filming. We can figure it out."

It sounds so short, somehow. A couple months and she'll drop out of his life again, like she always does.

"Movie sets are the perfect place for relationship counseling," he says, leaning back in his seat and not looking at her.

"It is a _romantic_ comedy."

"And our romance is hilarious."

"I really do appreciate the advice, though," she tells him, sobering. "Thank you."

"Always," he says, meaning it, and they're called to set before she can respond.

It's probably for the best.

*

Madi doesn't show up until the second week of filming, which is actually pretty shocking, in retrospect. He would have expected her sooner, even with school in session.

"I hear you don't want to go to college," he tells her, when he finds her sitting in Clarke's chair between takes.

She doesn't look up from her phone. "I hear you think it's okay if I don't."

"If I were you, I'd go," he says. "Acting will be here after you go to college, but if you go to college late, you'll be older than everyone else. Which is fine, but I'd just do it now."

"That's what you're going with?"

"It's your life, you can do what you want. I'm just telling you what I'd do."

"Is that why you didn't go to college? Clarke said you wanted to and I should learn from your mistakes."

"Maybe not her best angle." She finally looks up, cocking her head curiously, and he flops into the seat next to her. "I didn't want to be a big deal. And I didn't want to get into college just because I was Bellamy Blake. I really wanted to live in an alternate universe where I just went to college and had a normal life. To see what it was like."

"And you think I'll be a big deal no matter what?"

"Bit, but not huge." He grins at her. "No offense, but you're not that famous."

"Not that famous _yet_."

"You want to be?"

"You guys are so weird," she says, in a perfect teenage huff. "It's like you don't want anyone else in the world to be famous."

"Yeah, we want all the fame for ourselves," he says, dry. But of course he can't leave it there."Look, I love acting, I wouldn't really want to do anything else. But the industry is shitty in all kinds of ways. I still lose roles when casting directors meet me and my skin is darker than they were expecting. You have to love it or need it, or it's not worth it. And you don't need it."

"I might love it."

"You might. But if you don't, you're going to want a degree. Even if you do love it, you might want one. And you might find something else to love. Acting isn't going anywhere."

"So I should go to college before it starts feeling weird?"

"I would. But it's up to you. You've got options, I didn't think I did. And I just got lucky."

"I'm already lucky."

"That's not a bad thing."

"No, but it's a _weird_ thing. I wasn't lucky until Clarke decided she wanted to keep me. If I get a career, I can take care of myself. If something happens to Clarke or she changes her mind or--" She sighs. "College is so _expensive_. If I'm acting, I'm making money, not losing it."

"Clarke isn't going to change her mind. And even if she did, if she said she'd pay for college, she'd pay for college. Plus, if something happens to her, she'll leave most of her stuff to you, so you'll be fine, except for the trauma."

She shares her terrible sense of humor with him and Clarke, so she smiles. "Except for that, yeah."

"And it's not like she's the only person you have. If you need anything, you can always come to me."

It doesn't feel like a strange thing to say, but Madi fixes him with a look that makes him feel transparent, like every single thing he's ever said was the wrong thing, like he fucked this up years ago, somehow.

"Did you guys really get married?"

"Probably not. Does it matter?"

"What if you wanted to marry someone else? Would you have to get divorced from her?"

"If we don't know if we're married, I doubt anyone else does. Unless Jaha shows up at one of our weddings with some proof that we're already married to each other. Which actually does sound like something he'd do," he admits. As soon as he's thought of it, he can imagine it vivid detail. Jaha really would.

"Have you ever wanted to marry anyone else?"

It's a trap of a question, but he doesn't bother quibbling about whether or not he's ever actually wanted to marry Clarke. He has a younger sister; he knows the only way to win the "do you like this person" game is not to play.

"I've thought about it a couple times, but it always seemed like too much work. When you actually get married, instead of your director hiring a real priest to play a part, there's a lot to do. And there was always so much attention when I was dating someone, marrying someone would have been even worse. Public breakups suck enough, I wasn't looking for a public divorce."

"Clarke said she would have married her first girlfriend, if it was legal when they were dating. But then it's like, well, they broke up, so maybe it's good they didn't get married?"

"Maybe if they got married, it would have been different." He shrugs. "Or maybe not. I'm not really an expert."

"Unless you've been married to Clarke for twenty years. Then you guys have one of the most successful relationships in Hollywood."

"I think we probably have that anyway," says Clarke, coming up behind Madi. "Get out of my chair and stop bothering Bellamy."

"Bellamy likes being bothered," Madi says, but she does get up. "And he's selling me on college."

"Yeah? Maybe you should keep my seat after all."

"Too late, I'm going to go hang out with the camera crew. Maybe I can be a director, there aren't enough women directing."

Clarke smiles. "You could go to school for film studies, you know. That could be fun."

"Isn't the best way to learn by doing?" Madi asks, grinning and flitting off before Clarke can argue. 

"I'm pretty sure she's going to be fine," Bellamy tells Clarke, and she smiles, so warm it makes his whole life better.

"Yeah, I think so too."

*

Anxiety sets in about a week before filming ends, and it's so much worse than he was expecting it to be. The movie's going to be good--not an Oscar-winner or anything, but a rom-com that might get some amount of critical acclaim, at least--so that's not a problem, but he's aware, every day, that he's getting one day closer to losing Clarke. Which is ridiculous, because she's not going anywhere, but it's been so _good_ , spending time with her. Before the movie started, two-and-a-half months of filming with Clarke felt like the best bonus ever, and now he's finding himself wishing for endless reshoots, for another movie, for someone to decide this should be a TV show so they can be on set for months and months.

He doesn't ever want it to end.

"You know you can see someone even when you're not making a movie with them, right?" Raven asks. She's his token non-Hollywood friend, and her primary role in his life is reminding him that he makes things way too complicated. "You don't have anything else lined up after this, you can just be friends. Or, you know, ask her out already."

It's what he was expecting, so he doesn't react. "I'm not asking her out."

"Yeah? Why not?"

"Because it wouldn't work out."

"Uh huh. Based on what?"

"Years of experience. Dating in Hollywood is a nightmare."

"So you're just planning to die alone?"

"I'm hoping I live long enough to make it to a retirement home, and then I die with other old people."

Raven rolls her eyes, but she's smiling. "Dick. Seriously, you've been half in love with her for twenty years, and every time you see her, you fall all the way again. At least if you ask her out, you can find out if it would work instead of telling yourself it won't just because you're a chickenshit."

"But then I have to stop being a chickenshit." He pauses, deliberate. "Is it really _a_ chickenshit? I thought it was an adjective."

"Wow," says Raven, as he deserves. "You're that desperate to not talk about this, huh?"

He rubs his face. "Fuck, I don't know. What am I supposed to say?"

"You missed her, you always miss her, you want to spend more time with her, you want to make out. All the stuff you're already telling me. Except for the making out, that was subtext."

"I really should have gotten over her," he finally says. "I _did_ get over her."

She pauses. "So I had a crush on this dude at my programming camp in high school. I only ever saw him for a couple weeks over the summer, so it never felt real. Like, I had a boyfriend, but when I saw this guy I was always like, oh yeah, I'm into him. And then I saw him after all the shit with Finn went down and I was single for the first time, and I thought something could actually happen. But he was still just this random summer guy. And I knew that this was our last year at camp and it was either going to happen or I'd never see him again."

"And?"

"And I figured it wasn't worth it, but I ran into him at a party a couple years later. He was going to college pretty near me. And I was still into him, we made out, dated for a few months. I never got over him, I just didn't see him enough that it mattered most of the time. You've never been over Clarke Griffin because every time you see her, she's fucking _all_ you see. So you should try to see her more often." She pauses. "And if she's asking you if you guys are secretly _married_ , she's probably thinking about you too."

"That would be nice," he admits. "If she's not, I'm the asshole who--"

"Stop. You're not an asshole for liking her. You're just an asshole if you handle it wrong. If she's not into you, let it go, move on. You know how this works."

"You can't let me feel sorry for myself for two seconds?"

"If she turns you down, you can mope on my couch for as long as you need. But don't--whatever the opposite of counting your chickens before they hatch is. I'm not talking you through heartbreak that hasn't even happened."

"Fair enough." He sighs. "If I tell her now, it feels like a waste. Like--why didn't I just tell her twenty years ago? We lost all this time."

She cuffs him, gentle, just to make a point. "The longer you go, the more time you're losing. Take the time you can get, dumbass."

"You're actually pretty good at this."

"I've been listening to you complain for _years_ , I get to have some opinions. Besides," she adds, smirking. "We don't need another celebrity divorce."

He has to laugh. "Yeah, can't have that."

*

Bellamy's never been very good at asking people out, despite his best efforts. The first time he decided to try it, in high school, before he'd started acting, he wrote up a script and rehearsed in front of the mirror, but before he could ask, he found out she was dating someone else. And then he started acting, and it felt like no one ever had a fucking _conversation_ about going out, just ended up hooking up at some sketchy party and then continued doing it until the urge passed.

His best relationships have been started, somewhat unhelpfully, by other people making the first move, or by some sort of mutual, unspoken accord, some subtle change in the wind that doesn't seem to be happening with Clarke, no matter how hard he tries to make it happen through sheer force of will.

So he finally says, "Do you want a divorce?"

As pickup lines go, it leaves something to be desired, but at least it gets her attention.

"If we're not legally married, how would we even get a divorce?"

He rubs the back of his neck. They're waiting for their cars to show up and take them home, with only the after-party to go before they're done with the whole thing. Timing was always going to be awkward, but this seemed safest. "It was more of a conceptual question."

Her smile is fond. "Bellamy."

"I know." He lets out a short, sharp breath. "Every time I'm with you for more than about ten minutes, I remember I have this giant, stupid crush on you. And it feels like I should just tell you, so I can maybe see you for more than ten minutes every few years. Because I want to. I want to see you all the time."

"So you _don't_ want a divorce."

If she's still teasing, still smiling, it can't be that bad. He couldn't have ruined everything.

"No," he says. "I definitely don't want a divorce."

"Good."

She doesn't make him respond to that, tugging him in for a kiss before he's even quite processed it. It's not the first time he's kissed her--they've played love interests in two movies, after all--but it's the first time he's kissed her without cameras, without anyone telling him where to put his hands or how to angle his face for optimal lighting. It's the first time he's actually gotten to enjoy it, and he really does.

"I can't believe I led with _I think we're married_ on the _first day_ and it took you this long to make a move," she teases, and he laughs.

"Because _that's_ a normal pick-up line." He kisses her again. "So, you're going to be my date to this wrap party?"

"Do you put out?"

"Definitely."

She grins. "Then what are we waiting for?"

*

"So, what was it like working together again? It's been a while, right?"

Bellamy and Clarke exchange a look, the usual semi-telepathic exchange to figure out which of them should take point on the response. 

He wins. "Last time was 1999, yeah. _Days and Nights_."

"A very different vibe," says the interviewer.

"Definitely. Not just because of the tone of the movies," he adds. "But it's really different being a kid on your first prestige movie set and an industry veteran filming a rom-com."

"It wasn't my first prestige set," Clarke points out. "And rom-coms can be prestigious."

"They can. And I'm really proud of what we did for this one. But we all know that we're not winning any awards for being two nice people who fall in love."

"You didn't win any awards for being a morally conflicted werewolf either."

"I guess not. But I did get that Oscar that one time."

"Yeah, brag about it."

The interviewer smiles, apparently charmed. "So, you two still get along."

"Yeah, it's been great," Clarke says. "We're friends, but it's hard to keep in touch. Working with someone again after all this time, it's like getting paid to hang out with your best friend."

"Your husband," he says, like it's an accident and not something they discussed in exhaustive detail. It's probably good publicity. And it's not like he minds if people think he and Clarke are dating. For once, he wants to tell the whole world about it.

"Oh right, my husband."

It takes the interviewer a second to recover. "Excuse me?"

"Clarke thinks we got married on _Days and Nights_."

"I'm not saying it definitely happened; I just think it's possible that it counts."

"Jaha wanted the marriage scene to feel real and dramatic, so he hired a local priest to do it. I remember the producer wanting to murder him. They had to jump through so many hoops for a SAG card."

"And then the priest did exactly what he does for all marriages. I think there's an argument to be made that we've been married for twenty years."

"And you're making that argument."

"Madi says we're the most successful Hollywood marriage she can think of."

"Probably because we didn't know. We didn't have a chance to screw it up."

"So now that you know, the marriage is going to fall apart?" the interview asks, finally recovering some professional cool.

Bellamy glances at Clarke. Thanks to post-production and distribution issues, it's been over a year since they wrapped the movie, and it feels like it shouldn't be long enough to feel so confident about her. The last time he had a relationship this long, it went down in flames. But he's older now, knows himself better, knows Clarke.

He waited long enough to get this, and he's not planning to lose it.

"Nah," he says. "I think we're going to be fine."


End file.
